Woman, 73, sentenced in fatal crash

A 73-year-old woman who crashed a car into a City Heights bus stop, killing a young mother and injuring her boyfriend and 4-year-old son, was placed Friday on probation for three years.

Jean Chizer-Williams, a diabetic, is believed to have experienced a bout of extremely low blood sugar on June, 4, 2011 when she lost control of her PT Cruiser and caused fatal injuries to Vanessa Mae Shane, 25, of El Cajon.

In addition to probation, Chizer-Williams was ordered to serve a year in local custody with an electronic monitoring device attached to her body, commonly referred to as house arrest. She had pleaded guilty in January to vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence and admitted she caused great bodily injury to the victims.

San Diego Superior Court Judge Charles Gill determined Friday that probation was appropriate, given the defendant’s declining health made it unlikely she would put others at risk.

But the judge warned her that if she drove a car it would be a violation of probation and she could be sent to prison for eight years.

Her cries grew louder as she and other family members left the courtroom and gathered together in the hallway. The sobs turned to screams.

The collision occurred shortly before 8 p.m., at University Avenue near Euclid Avenue. Vanessa Mae Shane had been at a neighborhood park earlier that day with her son, Elijah, and her boyfriend, David Abilez.

They were waiting for a bus when they spotted a car coming at them. Abilez said in court Friday that the last words he heard from Shane were, “Baby, watch out!”

Abilez said he had just turned his head when he was knocked backward and into a window. In the 18 months that followed, he had multiple surgeries to repair damage to one of his legs.

“There’s just so much pain going on in my body right now,” he said. “My heart is aching. ... We’ll never be the same because of one selfish person.”

Chizer-Williams had been warned previously not to drive because of her condition. She had been in three previous crashes since 2006, and her license had been suspended, prosecutors said.

The defendant apologized in court for what she had done.

“The pain that I’ve caused you and your family, I’m sorry,” she said. To Elijah, now 6, she said, “I can’t begin to know the suffering that I’ve caused you.”

Chizer-Williams’ health has deteriorated since the collision. She suffered a stroke and her vision worsened. She can now only see large shadows, her lawyer said.